Introducing the new iTutor!

Interested in tutoring? I’m going to be taking a few students in November for more info click here.

Spline Doctors, where are you…teaching?

Its the new semester and a lot of folks have been inquiring about where they can take classes that the Spline Doctors teach at. Originally, when this blog was started, all the teachers were at the Academy or Art University in San Francisco. It was myself, Angus, Mike, Scott Clark and Stephen Gregory. Alot of us are doing different things. Angus is not teaching right now, Mike is also taking a break, as is Stephen Gregory. At the Academy of Art University in San Francisco, here are the guys teaching the 4 animation classes that are within the “pixar” track, which is not really supposed to be called the pixar track. Pixar animators just happen to teach there.

Level one: Matt Majers and Michal Makerawictz (Matt is great animator who attended Cal-Arts and Michal is one of my former students that has been at Pixar for 4 or 5 years now.

Level one (class two) Andy Beall and Travis Hathaway. Andy and I went to school together. He worked at Warner Bros (iron Giant etc) and has headed up the animation fix team. He is a great teacher with alot of passion and knowledge. Travis is a Cal Arts grad who has been at Pixar since days of Finding Nemo. He is an amazing animator and a great teacher. We taught the summer interns this year.

Level Two Animation: Adam Burke and Mike Wu
Adam is an animation veteran of just about every major studio (Bluth, Warners, etc) and came on during the Incredibles. He brings a wealth of knowledge and a back east attitude. Mike is a 10 year Disney vet who also came on during the Incredibles. He is an awesome teacher and both guys can draw like mo-fo’s.

Level Three Animation: Scott Clark and Mark Walsh
Scott was a Supervising Animator on Cars and is Supervising on Pete Docters new film. Mark Walsh is a 10 year Veteran who was a directing animator on Finding Nemo and a Supervising Animator on Rat. Both guys will be working on the third installment of the Virgin Voyage group project, which is as close as you get to doing feature quality work in a school environment. Students are also going to be doing individual projects.

I am taking a semester off from the level 3 class to help start the Animation Program at the California College of Art (CCA). We are gathering some really good people to get the program going and we hope it will be different from other Animation Schools. Hopefully, Mark Andrew’s will be coming to teach Story come spring. I am really gonna miss teaching with the guys. It was a great run and most of all, I’ll miss the booze afterward and of course, the students.

As for Stephen Gregory, he is currently taking a break and is seeking individuals to mentor. (I think…) You will have to confirm with him… He is an amazing teacher and I would sign up if I was a student.

Former Spline Doc and veteran Pixar animator Billy Merrit is teaching at Ringling in Florida when he is not enjoying a cigar or fishing.

Good Luck to all the students this semester and keep your eyes peeled for more Spline Casts, Roundtables and posts during the year.

-Andrew

Way to go OHIO!

I’m sure many of you have heard about FJORG at siggraph this year. An Iron Animator event in which 16 competing teams from around the world had 32 hours to create the most impressive character-driven animation of at least 15 seconds in length adhering to at least one of two themes and using at least one of 16 sound bites. A couple months ago, I went to teach animation for a few days in Ohio. The guy who invited me to BGSU was head of the computer animation department at BGSU, or so I thought. His name was Jim Levasseur. We corresponded for a few months to actually set this thing up. When I got their, he picked me up in an old beater car with two other guys, Tomas Jech and Jacob Gardner. They looked really young to be faculty. Turns out they were not faculty, but students. Jim and the other guys were part of a computer animation club. They totally orchestrated the process of getting me out to BGSU. These three guys were totally driven. They really wanted to learn animation. At the very end of the class, they showed me a short film they were working on to get into the Fjorg thing. I thought it looked great.

Anyhow, they went on to win the FJORG competition! Three guys from Bowling Green State University. A true Cinderella story. Competing against professionals from places like Polygon Pictures and Tippet Studios. I did an email interview with them.

Interview

Great jobs guys. Any studio would be more than lucky to have you working with them. Especially, now that you proved that you will work long hours…
-Andrew

other links:

FJORG documentary
The film the submitted to get in
The Film that won

Californias’ Best Kept Secret

CSU SUMER ARTS 07

In terms of animation education, one of the best programs I have seen is CSU Summer Arts. When I got out of high school, I really wanted to learn stuff about animation. I think it was something I saw in an issue of Amiga World Magazine (I’m dating myself) that prompted me to check into a computer animation program that was being run by this organization. Back then, all the stars of computer animation gathered at Humboldt State University. We did films using swivel 3d. It was great! It was the first time I really knew that I wanted to make films. The CSU summer arts program has been running for 21 years now.. Lately, its been at Fresno State.

This Year I had the privilege of being a guest artist for the 5th time. Rick Vertolli has been the guiding light of the computer graphics program at CSU summer arts. The range of Guest Artists is really amazing. We had Mike Wellins, who is an independent film maker and director. He works up at Leica. Rusty Mills, who has been a Producer/Director for many projects including Pinky and the Brain and animaniacs. Brian Boyd, a TD from Pixar was their to talk about all aspects of color, lighting and also rigging. Chuck Harvey, who trained under Milt Kahl was also one of the guest artists. Chuck, having worked with the greats, had so much inspiring artwork to show. His collection of animation art blew everyone away. The subject of this years workshop was character development. The students got to take acting classes from a teacher from Second City and then develop that character using a CG rig. Things like Walk cycles, Pose Tests and Acting scenes are some of the work being done. The students were also lucky enough to get a tour of Pixar, which usually is impossible to do for a group this size.

Another great thing about summer arts is the fact that alot of other workshops are going on around the campus. There is an energy that really feels great. Students are working till 2 am. Its an intense experience. One thing that should be noted is that 80% of students receive some sort of scholarship. When you think about how expensive animation education can be, this is why Summer Arts is the best kept secret in animation education. The culmination of the work will be on Friday, the 27th of July 2007

-Andrew

Congratulations "Virgin Voyage"!

I just wanted to tip my hat to Andrew Gordon, Scott Clark and all of their students who worked so hard on their class project last semester “Virgin Voyage” which recently took an award for “Audience Choice” at AAU’s 1st annual Epidemic Film Festival in San Francisco. For those not familiar with previous posts about this project, Scott and Andrew recorded improvisation performers and had their students put it through it’s paces, simulating a working production environment. They designed characters and sets, laid out the sequence, animated, and lit and rendered. It’s great to see innovative teaching and great student work get recognized. Congratulations again to everyone involved!

Adam